Slay the Spire 2
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Slay the Spire 2 1.0 release: Sep 2027Not announced: our best guess from Mega Crit's 1 to 2 year Early Access plan.
Best guessMega Crit's Early Access FAQ on Steam says it will stay in Early Access "Until the game feels great! Last time we thought it would be about a year and it took about 1.5 years. So perhaps in the same 1 - 2 year range." We count 18 months from the Mar 5, 2026 Early Access launch, as the first game took, to the first Thursday of Sep 2027 (Mega Crit ships on Thursdays) at 10 AM Pacific, the hour of the Early Access launch. Steam

10Months6Days

Development History

Slay the Spire 2 is made by Mega Crit, the studio of Casey Yano and Anthony Giovannetti, which began it around May 2021 in Unity and moved it to the Godot engine after Unity's Runtime Fee in September 2023. Art director Marlowe Dobbe led a brighter, more animated look, and Mega Crit announced the game in April 2024, delayed it once and launched it in Early Access on Mar 5, 2026.

Slay the Spire 2 is made and published by Mega Crit, "a remote indie game studio developing design-focused games" co-founded by Casey Yano and Anthony Giovannetti, the pair who made Slay the Spire. Mega Crit began the sequel "around May 2021" in the Unity engine, and after Unity announced its Runtime Fee in September 2023 it rebuilt the game in Godot, the open-source engine it now sponsors. Art director Marlowe Dobbe led a new art style, "more playful" and more animated than the first game's, and Mega Crit shared its progress in a monthly "Neowsletter" on Steam from October 2024. Announced in April 2024 for 2025 and delayed once, the game reached Steam Early Access on Mar 5, 2026, which Mega Crit called the result of "the past 5 years" of work.

Quick facts

Developer and publisher Mega Crit (self-published, per Steam)
Co-founders Casey Yano and Anthony Giovannetti
Studio Remote, with an office in Seattle where three of the team work
Art director Marlowe Dobbe
Development began "Around May 2021"
Engine Unity until 2023, then Godot (confirmed Apr 2024)
Godot support Gold sponsor from late 2023; Corporate Platinum since Apr 10, 2026
Announced Apr 10, 2024
Early Access Mar 5, 2026
Composer Clark Aboud (contributor)

Mega Crit

Mega Crit is a small studio that has grown slowly on purpose. Its About page lists Marlowe Dobbe (art director), Jake Card (lead programmer), programmers Danielle Jenkins, Jose Pacio and Ed Lu, animator Chris Gortz, community manager Demi Montes and artist Anailis Dorta, with composer Clark Aboud and metrics specialist Jake Rabinowitz as contributors. Casey Yano wrote in April 2026: "We won't massively expand the size of the studio to finish the game faster."

The team works mostly remotely. The whole team met in Seattle during PAX West 2024, and "Three of us work out of an office" there, Yano wrote in October 2024; in spring 2025 everyone met in Japan, by which time the game had been in development "more than 3 years".

Yano and Giovannetti split the public voice of the game. Yano answers the community's questions in many of the Neowsletters; Giovannetti added designer's notes to the patch notes from v0.101.0 in March 2026. Demi Montes, posting as "demileaf", runs the Steam FAQ and voices the Ancient Nonupeipe, whose name came from a "NOPE" placeholder icon read twice ("NONOPEPE"), per the June 2026 Neowsletter.

The first game

Slay the Spire entered Early Access in late 2017 and started slowly. Game Developer reported it sold only about 800 copies in its first three days, until a Chinese streamer turned it around and China came to about 30% of sales; it sold 700,000 by April 2018 and more than 1.5 million by March 2019. Its 1.0 release was on Jan 23, 2019.

Its Early Access ran longer than planned, which shapes the sequel's. Mega Crit's store page recalls: "Last time we thought it would be about a year and it took about 1.5 years." Mega Crit counts about 8.5 years between the two games' Early Access launches, per its January 2026 Neowsletter. How the two compare is on Differences from Slay the Spire.

Development begins (2021)

Work on Slay the Spire 2 began around May 2021, in Unity. The first boss Mega Crit designed was the Ceremonial Beast, "the first boss design for Slay the Spire 2 (designed in 2021)", which Yano based on the Forest Spirit from Princess Mononoke; it is now an Act 1 boss of the Overgrowth.

Unity's Runtime Fee and the move to Godot

The sequel's existence came out through an engine crisis. On Sep 13, 2023, after Unity announced its per-install Runtime Fee, Mega Crit made its "first-ever" public statement, PCGamesN reported: "The Mega Crit team has been hard at work these past two-plus years on a new game," and "unlike with Slay the Spire, the engine we have been developing it in is Unity." It called the fee "a violation of trust" and said it would migrate "unless the changes are completely reverted and TOS protections are put in place."

Mega Crit tested Godot with a small game first. In October 2023 it released Dancing Duelists, a deckbuilding autobattler made "in 3 weeks in the Godot Engine", as "a technical exploration to assess the viability of switching from the Unity Engine to Godot."

The move was finished by 2024. Mega Crit confirmed to IGN in April 2024 that Slay the Spire 2 had fully moved to Godot, and its 2024 recap lists "Fully migrated engine for Slay the Spire 2 and made significant progress". Yano has said the "fancier game engine" makes effects such as shiny rare cards easier (November 2024).

Mega Crit backs Godot with money. It became a Gold sponsor of the Godot Engine in late 2023, and on Apr 10, 2026 Godot announced Mega Crit had raised its support to the Corporate Platinum level, about EUR 36,000 a year, GamingOnLinux reported.

The new engine also ended compatibility with the first game's mods. Yano wrote in March 2025: "Compatibility is impossible between sts1 and sts2 as it's a separate game engine." The sequel has its own mod loader, on Mods and Steam Workshop.

The art direction

Marlowe Dobbe leads the art. Yano introduced Dobbe, known for the Thief in Dicey Dungeons, in the October 2024 Neowsletter as having joined about three years earlier, with animator Chris Gortz and Anailis Dorta, the first game's card and event illustrator.

The look changed on purpose. In the October 2024 Neowsletter Yano listed the changes as more playful, crisper and less painterly art, more animation, more "whole-screen art" and more color. Event art now fills the screen (June 2025), map icons are bigger and colored (November 2024), and potions got their own sprites (August 2025).

Early Access ships with rough placeholder art in places, and Yano has explained it as a choice over AI-generated art, per Rock Paper Shotgun (Jul 14, 2026). PCGamesN's review listed the placeholder Epoch art among its cons; Major Update #2 replaced the art for nine Epochs.

Design decisions Mega Crit explained

There are no alternate starting decks. Yano said in June 2025 that players "would just choose the best one", so the choice moved to Neow's blessings at the start of the run instead.

The Ancients replace the first game's boss relics. Neow opens the run, and a random Ancient at the start of Acts 2 and 3 offers relics that take the place of boss relics, per the November 2025 Neowsletter. See Neow and the Ancients.

Afflictions came from the first game's code. Mega Crit said a similar, unused system was found in Slay the Spire's files, and in the sequel enemies "Afflict" your cards (April 2025). Enchantments, the friendly version, never stack on one card: "We want our players to experience deckbuilding rather than cardbuilding!" See Enchantments and Afflictions.

Ascension stops at 10, not 20. Yano wrote in August 2026: "Ascension 10 is close to the highest difficulty we'll have for the game. Grinding out Ascension 20 would be quite a chore as there are more characters in the sequel." See Ascension.

Other rules stayed. The hand size limit is still 10 with "no way to increase it at this time"; there is no endless mode ("Probably not"), because, in Yano's words, "the deckbuilding gets less exciting the longer a run goes on"; and save scumming is allowed: "Yeah you can still save scum. Play how you want."

Mods do not feed the base game. Asked about adopting mod ideas, Yano said in May 2025: "Making content is one of the parts of making video games. I'm not sure why we would ever add content from a mod."

Some designs came from other games. The removed Act 3 boss, the Doormaker, came from Yano "playing too much Deadlock", not from the Worm web serial.

The Neowsletter

Mega Crit's monthly newsletter, the "Neowsletter", began on the game's Steam page with the October 2024 issue. Through 2025 each issue revealed one system, from Enchantments in February to the Ancients in November (February 2025), with community questions answered by Yano. After launch it carries the roadmap, statistics such as win rates, and community art; the latest is the September 2026 issue. Every dated step is on Release History.

The delay

Mega Crit delayed the game once. On Sep 11, 2025 it moved Early Access from its fall 2025 target "to a secret Thursday in March 2026," explaining: "Some personal life stuff hit the team (everyone's okay!), we kept saying 'wouldn't it be cool if...' one too many times, and honestly, the game just needs more polish." The date, Mar 5, 2026, followed on Feb 19, 2026 with 4-player co-op.

After launch

Development continues in Early Access with the same small team. Engineer Ed Lu reworked the random number generator in Major Update #2 after player tckmn found correlated random numbers, and Mega Crit added Steam Workshop support. Launch was hard on the team: in March 2026 Yano wrote, "Even though I threw out my back from overworking, I'm feeling high in spirits." What comes next is on Early Access and Roadmap, and every patch on Patches and Updates.

Frequently asked questions

Who made Slay the Spire 2? Slay the Spire 2 is made and published by Mega Crit, co-founded by Casey Yano and Anthony Giovannetti, the makers of Slay the Spire. Marlowe Dobbe is the art director.

What engine does Slay the Spire 2 use? Slay the Spire 2 uses the Godot engine. Mega Crit started it in Unity and moved after Unity's Runtime Fee in September 2023, confirming the full move in April 2024.

Why did Slay the Spire 2 leave Unity? Mega Crit left Unity because of the Runtime Fee announced in September 2023, which it called "a violation of trust" in its first-ever public statement. It said it would migrate unless the changes were reverted and terms-of-service protections added.

When did development of Slay the Spire 2 start? Development of Slay the Spire 2 began "around May 2021", per Mega Crit's FAQ, and its first boss, the Ceremonial Beast, was designed that year.

Where is Mega Crit based? Mega Crit is a mostly remote studio; Casey Yano wrote in October 2024 that "Three of us work out of an office" in Seattle. It made both Slay the Spire games.

Why does Slay the Spire 2 have only 10 Ascension levels? Casey Yano said Slay the Spire 2 stops at 10 because "Grinding out Ascension 20 would be quite a chore as there are more characters in the sequel," and that A10 is close to the highest difficulty the game will have.

Sources

Moments

Slay the Spire 2: Q&A with Anthony & Dani of Mega Crit

Manifest Conference

  1. Slay the Spire 2 is made and published by Mega Crit, "a remote indie game studio developing design-focused games"…
  2. Mega Crit is a small studio that has grown slowly on purpose. Its About page lists Marlowe Dobbe (art director), Jake…
  3. The team works mostly remotely. The whole team met in Seattle during PAX West 2024, and "Three of us work out of an…
  4. Work on Slay the Spire 2 began around May 2021, in Unity. The first boss Mega Crit designed was the Ceremonial Beast…
  5. Early Access ships with rough placeholder art in places, and Yano has explained it as a choice over AI-generated art…
  6. Mods do not feed the base game. Asked about adopting mod ideas, Yano said in May 2025: "Making content is one of the…

Every page

See also

Last updated Oct 26, 2026 by the Vi.ki team. Page text CC BY-SA 4.0.

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